Heroes of Magic and Might
Chapter 23 – Strange men, strange days
…
It was an odd sort of morning that found you up a tree. An odd sort of bird who sat in that tree, his legs dangling down out of reach of the teeth. An odder bird still that had no wings, forced to climb the tree to escape the teeth, and the hairy dog bodies attached.
"Well, I dare say this is quite the pickle, isn't it?" the small man said to himself.
Generally it is seen as a bad sign when one starts talking to themselves, but in the case of Bill Baggs, who had been doing it for so long the other him was well past the teenage rebellion faze and getting into portly middle age, it was just a matter of course, of course.
When you traveled the trails of the world alone as he did, you found you missed the sound of words. Howling and growling just did not evoke the old-time comforts of hearth, home, and civilization. You missed those sorts of things in the wilderness.
Much like you missed walls and doors when you were stuck up a tree, surrounded by wolves.
"And the morning started off so lovely too. Well now what am I supposed to do?" he inquired to no one in particular, since there was no one in particular there to hear him, let alone answer the question.
Birds chirped from several trees away, they were no help, and squirrels scampered about their business, unconcerned with terrestrial matters that couldn't climb trees. With one exception.
He, the exception, watched the small man sitting in the tree with some interest. The small man noticed this interest and stared back curiously. The squirrel countered this curiosity with a thoughtful scratch of its chin, to which the small man responded with a bewildered tilt of the head.
The squirrel, sitting one branch up, considered the man who considered right back.
"Don't suppose you've got any ideas by chance?" He certainly didn't and he was not above taking advice from a squirrel, given he was below it.
The squirrel looked around then scurried across the tree to another branch. This one was thicker, stronger, necessarily so as the tiny tree rodent magically morphed into a full grown, or late teenish, shirtless, man.
"Morning," he greeted.
"My word!" the small man greeted back. "This morning really is getting strange."
"Strange isn't so bad," the man said, casually swinging his legs, "beats whatever's going on down there."
Couldn't argue with that. "I don't suppose you could do something about them. Only, my butt has fallen asleep on this branch so I'd really rather like to get off."
The youngish man looked down at the wolf pack, circling, snarling, gnashing their teeth.
"Any number of things I could do really," he said. "Most would be quite a waste though. I mean, what good is a bunch of dead wolves to anyone."
"Well I see your point of course, it's just, if it comes to them or me, I'm much more partial to me you understand," he was the only him he had after all.
"A valid point," the young man said. "Still, I hate to be wasteful. Product of my upbringing you see. Can't say I enjoyed it, the upbringing I mean, but, there you are."
"Here I am," the small man agreed.
"Can you hang around a bit?"
"Don't see why not," the branch had held him this long.
"Excellent. I'm just going to run along and get my friend. She should be able to wrangle this bunch without anyone dying. Back in flash."
Gone in a flash too, or perhaps not so much a flash as a pop.
"I say, this morning really is getting strange," he mused, glancing downward once more. "I don't suppose you lot would like to discuss this like civilized people?"
The response he got was something less than civilized.
"Hmm, worth a try," and it really had started out as such a nice morning.
… Oh, cry me a river
"Stupid, cruddy mornings!"
"Oh, do get over it already."
If there was one thing Blaise Zabini couldn't stand it was complainers. I mean, unless it was him complaining, then it was totally justified, but when other people did it, just a lot of whining is what it was, and he couldn't stand that.
"I don't see why we have to be out here so early!" they continued to gripe.
"Because the day starts when the sun rises, not when it reaches its peak," said Blaise. "Now stop your whining and swing that axe. Wood isn't going to split itself."
"I don't see you swinging an axe. Where do you get off telling me what to do?"
Blaise smile, he'd been hoping that question would come up. "As general supervisor, my duties are far more cerebral and infinitely more important than merely swinging an axe which any brainless oaf can do."
His fancy title, which he'd given himself, existed purely by virtue of his being the oldest of the first draft meaning he had seniority. There were only two others among the woodcutters older than he. They were both Hufflepuff and possessed all the charisma of a pair of marshmallows which they somewhat resembled, soft and squishy. Their only redeeming qualities came from their ability to follow orders and not complain overly, unlike the one currently staring mutiny at him.
Fortunately for Blaise he was only a Ravenclaw and didn't possess that mutiny in sufficient quantities to use it.
"Hmph! More trouble than it's worth," he grumbled under his breath.
An idea Blaise hoped to ingrain in all those directly beneath him. Why cling to power through hard work when you could just convince everyone else it would be too much work for them to try and take it.
It wasn't all champagne and caviar though, being the boss. Sometimes you actually had to do stuff. Like when one of the second years came running up with a problem.
"What is it? Don't tell me one of the saw blades broke again," it was bound to happen when you had first and second years doing the transfiguration.
The first time it had nearly turned one of them into swiss cheese.
"There's a bird sitting on the logs!"
… the what?
"Can you say that again. I'm almost certain I didn't hear you correctly."
"There's a big blue bird sitting on the logs."
"Uh huh… alright, I give up. What's the joke?"
"It's not a joke," the young boy said. "There's a big blue bird sitting on the logs and it won't get off."
Oh for Merlin's sake, "Just shoo it away."
"We tried that. It just sat there and stared at us like we were crazy or something."
Smart bird, the Slytherin thought, "You're telling me no one down there can get one stupid bird off the logs. So just move them with the bird on there. He sees those saw blades coming he'll move on his own."
"We can't. Every time we try and levitate the log he's on, it just drops back down. We don't know why."
Incompetence was the first thing that came to mind. He dismissed the idea purely because there were several Slytherin boys down there as well and anyway, they'd been doing this every day for weeks. Sort of odd they'd start failing now.
"Fine! Let's see this magical blue bird," the general supervisor groaned, following after the distressed wood cutter, making sure to display the appropriate level of annoyance.
He always felt it represented a failure on his part if his subordinates couldn't solve a problem themselves without his intervention. A failure to properly delegate responsibility to someone else.
Coming round the end of the finished stacks he saw the uncut timbers and the affronting bird in question. He paused a moment to collect himself, hiding his surprise so as not to appear weak.
When he'd said blue bird, Blaise had assumed bluebird, maybe a blue jay if they were being particularly ignorant. The bird in question was much larger than either, looking a bit like a parrot but notably larger. There was a hint of its tailfeathers hiding behind it that something of a peacock. Such a bird he had never seen. Oh well.
"Alright, alright, what's all this then?" he blustered, marching up with the swagger of authority.
"Bird won't move," said one of the older boys, the Hufflepuff's.
"Won't he?" said Blaise. "Have you tried asking nicely."
The snideness of his tone seemed to go over the older boy's head, "You think that would work?"
Oh, for Merlin's sake, "I think, you've all wasted enough time," he snapped, drawing his wand on the obstructing avian who stared back with eyes of brushed gold.
Eyes that flashed, drawing a gasp from the Slytherin just before he was hurled through the air into the solid stacks behind him. Crumpling to the ground with an agonizing thud, his body trembled as he attempted to rise.
Shocked still, it was only the boy nearest who heard Blaise moan, "Get—Dumbledore," before falling flat into the land of the unconscious.
… Mornings, am I right
"Truly this has been a strange morning," said old Bill Baggs as he passed around the tea. "Not that I'm complaining bout her ladyship's assistance, I'd just like to make that perfectly clear, but I never would have expected to be saved by a vampire, never mind one so adorable."
Lacking sufficient blood to blush there was no reddening of her cheeks at the small man's praise, that did not stop it from being obvious how embarrassed she was by his praise.
"It—really, it was nothing," she said, attempting to affect an aloof demeanor with limited success. "Vampires have a natural rapport with wolves, it was just a matter of communication."
"Yeah, communication," Harry mumbled around his tea. "The universal language spoken by stomachs everywhere."
Sizzling over the fire which also warmed the tea, an early lunch of tough pork cooked under the wizard's watchful eye. The wolves, so recently menacing the small man sitting next to him, had been fed on cold meat and now lay around the impromptu campsite, fully sated, docile as lambs.
"I hope you won't think me rude, but I really must ask. Do you normally go about so, brazenly? I mean in your manner of dress."
Harry scowled slightly; slightly more when Rosebud snickered, "I only had the one shirt. Sadly, it was lost in the throes of passion."
"Don't you mean flight from passion?" said Rosebud with barely contained mirth.
"I still don't find the situation funny you know," Harry pouted, turning the meat to show he was ignoring her.
"Bit of lady trouble was it?" Bill said. "Can't say's I've had much experience there myself. Though by coincidence, I am on my way to see a lady if you can believe it."
"I see no reason I shouldn't," said Harry. "Anyone I know?"
"Given the direction you said you came from I shouldn't think so. She lives alone you see, just her and the forge. That's her hobby, smithing. Damn fine at it too. She was the one that made this," he said, patting the 'very' short sword that leaned against the log where he was seated.
"Made to size," Harry remarked to the small man's amusement. "She a nice sort?"
"Oh, very. She's a remarkably good personality for a goblin."
"Goblin?" so this world has goblins as well, he thought.
"Well, half goblin technically. Though you wouldn't guess it at first glance. Quite a comely girl for having goblin blood."
"I'll take your word for it," said Harry.
"No need for that," said Bill. "We're only about a half days walk. You can meet her if you like."
Did he like? Given how well his last few encounters had gone he was a bit hesitant. Had the small man asked right after he'd escaped from the Ashe, he would almost certainly have made his excuses and gone.
But that had been over a week prior.
"Why not," he said. "Might be nice to meet someone who won't try to kill me."
… ere, ee's not dead
"How is he?"
"He's not dead."
This was only a small comfort in Dumbledore's mind. The woodcutters had fled the woodpiles and taken the battered form of Blaise Zabini with them. It was only as they passed the doors where he was working that he learned of what happened.
A blue bird, a familiar description. It couldn't be a coincidence.
Madam Pomphrey's wand moved in intricate circles as she worked over the battered young man. It irked Dumbledore that all he could do was watch. He was a powerful wizard, but he was not a healer.
"Albus!"
"Ah, Minerva—and Severus."
"What has happened? We heard someone was attacked," McGonagall said while Snape hovered behind her looking pensive.
"Sadly, it is so. Though with any luck, not fatally," said Dumbledore, glancing again at the magnificent medi-witch.
"Slytherin, again," Snape growled, seeing another of his students in the hospital bed.
"A strange coincidence I'm sure," said Dumbledore, "though the perpetrator is hardly such. Those that brought him in described a parrot like blue bird, identical to the one I chased through the castle on that stormy eve some weeks back."
"You told me about that," said McGonagall. "It has returned then?"
"I'm not sure if it ever left. Regardless, there is nothing we can do here. Let us leave Poppy to her work and see about the safety of our students."
"Is it still there?" his second asked.
"According to what I was told, it didn't move when they left. Let us see if it has done so since."
Marching from the hospital wing and out of the castle the trio approached the woodpiles, ominously silent now that they'd been abandoned.
"On the logs, they said," Dumbledore mumbled as he walked.
And just so, the bird with the golden eyes sat as though waiting, precisely where he'd been, or so Dumbledore assumed, when the whole debacle began.
"Is that it?" McGonagall asked.
Dumbledore nodded.
"I believe I have just the spell," said Snape, gripping his wand angrily.
"I believe that may have been Mr. Zabini's mistake Severus," Dumbledore warned. "Let us at least attempt diplomacy."
Stepping away from his compatriots he approached the bird who watched with an avian attentiveness. It's golden eyes, so undiscernible, did not leave him for a moment.
"Good afternoon," said Dumbledore, halting a short throw from the bird. "My name is Albus Dumbledore. Perhaps you might introduce yourself?"
He didn't know what to expect from the strange blue creature. It was clearly magical, but that didn't mean much. He had no idea what to be prepared for and thus felt he was prepared for anything. This of course was wrong.
He was not prepared for the bird to become a man, though such a trick was not unknown to him. He was not prepared for that man to be the same blue color as the bird, nor to have long black hair tied back in a single segmented tail, ornamented in eye like gems.
He was not prepared for that blue skinned man to look at him with those same eyes, like two balls of brushed gold, and smile at him with teeth that glistened like pearls.
"I am Co," the blue man said in a cultured baritone. "Are you the master of this castle, Albus Dumbledore?"
"I am," said Dumbledore.
"Excellent," said Co with a cheerfulness that surprised the elderly wizard. "Then you are just the man I needed to find."
"Is that so?" said Dumbledore, fearing why this might be.
"Yes," the blue man said, his smile taking on a sinister edge, "you see, I've come to take your castle. And if I'm to do that, I shall need to know who I'm taking it from."
Stands to reason, dun it?